Guardian role undermined
valuable earnings out of public budgets,” she said in the letter.
In a telephone interview Thursday, Muzaffar said she feels that Waterfront Toronto’s responsibility to the public as guardian in the Sidewalk plan is being undermined by Sidewalk Labs, whose duty is to their shareholders and profits.
“Sidewalk is a vendor. You can’t design public policy with a vendor,” she told the Star.
Muzaffar, a “tech activist” and co-founder of Tech Reset, a “pro-growth, pro-innovation group” that monitors how urban data is collected and turned into a commodity, is the second member to step down from the advisory panel, which originally included 15 leading experts in Canada on digital technology, privacy and governance.
Two members of Waterfront Toronto’s senior leadership also resigned recently amid tensions surrounding Sidewalk Toronto.
Muzaffar said when she first came on the panel she was “open minded” about the pro- cess, but has since been turned off by Waterfront Toronto’s “anti-democratic” public engagement process regarding Sidewalk Toronto.
Dan Levitan, a spokesperson for Sidewalk Labs, said Thursday that the “panel is independent from (Sidewalk) and the resignation of a long-standing critic of the project is not a surprise. But we take seriously questions about data and expect in the months ahead to present and consult with the public on a comprehensive plan for data collection, use, and governance.”
Michael Geist, a law professor at the University of Ottawa where he is Canada research chair in internet and e-commerce law, said the panel’s work will continue.
“We are committed to helping shape the future of data and digital policy in Canada, and I will be working with Waterfront Toronto and my fellow panel members to make sure that (the panel) can achieve what it set out to do, namely to provide expert advice on emerging issues related to pri- vacy and data ownership,” Geist said in a statement. Added Michael Nobrega, acting CEO of Waterfront Toronto: “we are unwavering in our commitment to serving the public interest and look forward to receiving the advice of the panel.”
He went on to say, “we are also well supported by external privacy and legal experts.”
In May, Sidewalk Labs released a responsible data use policy framework, including a promise to make data collected as part of the project “open and accessible” without breaching privacy.
In terms of data stewardship, Sidewalk says it continues to explore “conventional approaches to data ownership in cities, the responsibilities that come with “owning” data, the technological and economic advantages of storing data in Canada, and innovative models of governing urban data, such as establishing a non-profit data trust.